If I type into a terminal,
export DISPLAY=:0.0
... where is the shell storing that environment variable?
I'm using Ubuntu 8.10. I've looked in the files ~/.profile and /etc/profile and can find no trace of DISPLAY.
This question is related to
linux
environment-variables
It's stored in the process (shell) and since you've exported it, any processes that process spawns.
Doing the above doesn't store it anywhere in the filesystem like /etc/profile. You have to put it there explicitly for that to happen.
If you want to put the environment for system-wide use you can do so with /etc/environment file.
That variable isn't stored in some script. It's simply set by the X server scripts. You can check the environment variables currently set using set.
Type "set" and you will get a list of all the current variables. If you want something to persist put it in ~/.bashrc or ~/.bash_profile (if you're using bash)
Source: Stackoverflow.com